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Stardate: 20250419.0117 | |
Location: The Lab | |
Input Device: tetsujin28 | |
Audio: computer fans | |
Visual: cleaned up workstation | |
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The lab has been a mess for quite some time now, with parts and | |
equipment not in the right places where they should be. This | |
happens to me sometimes and I don't feel like cleaning up for | |
extended periods of time until I get to the point were it is | |
miserable and demotivating with all of the mess and the clutter. I | |
don't even want to be in the space since it just psychically drains | |
any inspiration I might have at working on something. Well, it's | |
become awful enough where I've started clearing things up and | |
putting things back where they should be. I hate it when I get to | |
this point, but it is just part of what I do. Hopefully, I can | |
practice maintaining order so it's not such an uphill climb to work | |
on fun projects. | |
Lately, I have been tinkering with Meshtastic.[1] I've been | |
researching online about it for some time now, and finally got | |
around to ordering a couple boards. | |
Meshtastic is a firmware that you flash on to ESP32 boards for | |
decentralized off-grid mesh communications and projects. It uses | |
LoRa (Long Range) radios on the unlicensed part of the radio | |
spectrum, so you don't need a ham radio license or anything. | |
I picked up 2 Heltec ESP32 LoRa v3 boards that were on sale with a | |
case and antenna. The board has Bluetooth, Wifi, USB-C, lithium | |
battery interface, and a 0.96" OLED screen built in. These are | |
probably one of the cheapest boards to get started. Mine were | |
about $10US each. | |
The boards seem very easy to get going with Meshtastic, if you're | |
familiar with flashing images to Raspberry Pis or doing BIOS | |
updates on your computer. You can even flash the image directly | |
from a web browser, which is what I did. | |
It didn't take long to get everything assembled and flashed for | |
both units. Since these are very basic models, you need a computer | |
or a device to communicate with the boards. | |
For one unit, I decided to use an old android phone without a SIM | |
card to load the Meshtastic app. For the other unit, I plugged it | |
in directly to my laptop via USB. | |
I was surprised to see so many nodes show up, especially with the | |
stock antenna. Right now I see 115 nodes in the Los Angeles area, | |
2 nodes in San Jose, and 3 over by San Diego. I still don't know | |
too much of the technology or how the magic works, but I find the | |
idea of the mesh fascinating! I actually recognize some handles | |
attached to some of these devices from some of the local tech | |
communities I frequented long ago. | |
There is a default channel, which I am using and see the nodes in | |
my area, or you can set up private channels to keep communications | |
limited to your group or projects. It's been interesting seeing | |
the communications and the different types of data on some of the | |
nodes on the mesh. Some are basic like mine with not much data | |
except for general location, hardware type, uptime, etc. Others | |
have more information like weather station/environmental data. | |
People are sending messages on the default channel, but it is | |
mostly one-off messages or test messages. There were some messages | |
about the earthquake in San Diego from this past week. I wonder | |
how the messages looked like during the fires earlier this year. | |
So far, I have not found a specific use case, but I find the | |
technology interesting to explore and tinker with. Maybe I'll set | |
up a solar weather station or something. For now, I'm just | |
enjoying the exploration and seeing what other people are doing | |
with it. | |
[1] https://meshtastic.org/ | |
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